State GOP chairman John Dendahl reiterated his belief that Bush would take New Mexico.

"The system is working. I'm very gratified," Dendahl said."

State Democratic chairman Diane Denish said: "Clearly, it's a razor-thin lead on either side."

County Clerk Judy Woodward raised another wrinkle Friday evening: some 189 "in-lieu-of" ballots submitted by people who certified they never received absentee ballots they requested.

In-lieu ballots are checked against absentee ballots, and are counted only if there is not already an absentee ballot for that voter. Woodward said that typically, about half those ballots are never counted.

The precise number of in-lieu ballots could not be determined until at least Monday, and it could be several more days after that before results from such ballots would be known, election officials said.

Three days after polls closed, workers in New Mexico's most populous county discovered what seemed to be a 252-vote discrepancy among about 38,000 early-voting ballots and began hunting for missing ballots. Friday afternoon, state District Judge Theresa Baca, overseeing the count, reported 257 votes were found in a locked box in the county election warehouse, and she assumed that accounted for the discrepancy.

Then, County Attorney Tito Chavez announced 355 early votes on damaged ballots would be thrown out as "spoiled" after legal questions were raised. A poll worker objected to the decision, and Chavez reconsidered.

Denish called that "a flip-flop of opinion" and also questioned the numbers. She said ballot-counting observers were initially told the final batch of hand-counted ballots included 355 votes but that it turned out to be 379. She also noted the box with 257 votes had been missing overnight.